Expectation won four trophies at the Royal Television Society Awards, three of them for its BBC2 comedy Alma’s Not Normal.
Writer and star Sophie Willan won in both the comedy writing and female performance categories, while the second and final series of the show was crowned best comedy drama at last night’s ceremony.
The indie’s doc Hell Jumper, also for BBC2, was named best single documentary.
Other factual winners included Minnow Films’ BBC2 doc Atomic People (history), South Shore’s BBC1 series Freddie Flintoff’s Field of Dreams on Tour (formatted popular factual), Candour Production’s Channel 4 series The Push: Murder on the Cliff (documentary series) and Swan Films’ C4 single My Sexual Abuse: The Sitcom (arts).
Channel 4 picked up two awards for its Paralympics coverage, produced by Whisper Films: best sports programme and best sports presenter, commentator or pundit for the pairing of Clare Balding and Rose Ayling-Ellis.
Surprise moments included teenage actor Oliver Sewell winning best comedy performance – male for his turn as the young Alan Carr in Baby Cow’s ITV sitcom Changing Ends and Happy Prince’s Disney+ Jilly Cooper adaptation Rivals beating both Slow Horses and Wolf Hall: the Mirror and the Light for best drama writing.
ITV’s Mr Bates vs the Post Office went home empty-handed, with Kudos’ BBC1 drama This Town taking home the newly-combined limited series and single drama award.
While Roughcut’s BBC3 comedy Things You Should Have Done took home the scripted comedy award, Gavin and Stacey creators James Corden and Ruth Jones received the judges’ award for the long-running sitcom.
RTS chair Jane Turton also presented a special award for journalists in Gaza, which had originally been planned for the society's Television Journalism Awards on 5 March, but was initially scrapped due to the controversy over BBC doc Gaza: How to Survive a War Zone.
Explaining the decision to restore the award, Turton said the board of trustees "took the clear view it remains critically important to recognise journalists in Gaza".
She added: “For news organisations, the Middle East crisis poses an incredibly complex and fast-moving challenge. With international journalists unable to operate in Gaza, covering these important news stories has fallen to local media teams based there. These individuals often face extraordinary danger and report on events as they unfold with no regard sometimes for their personal safety.
“This award is not dedicated to one person, one team or even a single news organisation but recognises the courage and commitment of journalists risking their lives every day.”
For a full list of winners, see here
